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Thankful Halsey (1797-1837)
}} Biography Thankful Halsey was the first wife of Parley Parker Pratt (1807-1857), one of the original 12 apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They were married in Columbia New York, about 1827, before moving to Ohio and then joining the LDS Church there. She died following childbirth in March 1837 of their only son, Parley Parker Pratt (1837-1897) . Thankful was a widow when she married Pratt and was ten years older than him. She is buried in North Kirtland Cemetery. Headstone erected in 2008 through generous donations by family members to the Jared Pratt Family Association. Courtship of Thankful & Parley Discouraged at his hard luck and losses, he bade farewell in August, 1826, to the civilized world and went to spend his days in the solitudes of the Great West. About thirty miles west of Cleveland, Ohio, in the month of November (with the weather very rainy), he found himself without much money, and among strangers in this frontier land. He purchased a Bible, procured a gun from a neighbor, worked to earn an axe, and some breadstuff and other little extras, and retired two miles into the dense forest. Here he prepared a small cabin for his winter abode, and he worked and studied the Scriptures. It was the 4th of July, 1827, when he returned to his former home (Canaan, New York) and sought out Thankful Halsey. Here is his proposal: “In view of all these things,” said I to her, “If you still love me and desire to share my fortune, you are worthy to be my wife. If not, we will agree to be friends forever but part to meet no more in time.” “I have loved you during three years’ absence,” she said, “and I never can be happy without you.” Thankful Halsey decided to share his life and returned to the West with Parley. They were not to live long uninterrupted, however, for soon the urge to preach came upon him. He was a Reformed Baptist. Their home and farm was sold and he and his wife started East. They had paid their boat passage through to Albany, but near Newark, about one hundred miles from Buffalo, he disembarked, telling his wife to go on and that when his work was done, he would come to her. Parley's Journal Her husband recorded: “A few days previous to her death, she had a vision in open day while sitting in her room. She was overwhelmed or immersed in a pillar of fire, which seemed to fill the whole room as if it would consume it and all things therein; and the Spirit bred to her mind, saying: ‘Thou art baptized with fire and the Holy Ghost’. It also intimated to her that she should have the privilege of departing from this world of sorrow and pain, and of going to the Paradise of rest as soon as she had fulfilled the prophecy in relation to the promised son... My dear wife had now lived to accomplish her destiny; and when the child was dressed, and she had looked upon it and embraced it, she ceased to live in the flesh... She was buried in the churchyard near the Temple in Kirtland." 1837 Obituary Obituary of Thankful Halsey Messenger and Advocate, Kirtland, Ohio, vol. 3 Apr. 1837, No. 31 DIED In this town on the 24 ultimo of puerperal convulsions Sister T. consort of Elder Parley P. Pratt, aged 40 years. From the sudden and afflictive manner of her exit, the sensation produced in the minds of her acquaintance and friends, was peculiarly shocking, but it was doubly so to her surviving partner, who is thus called to part with the companion of his youth at a time when the maternal hand seemed of all periods to be most needed in rearing a tender offspring, the mutual pledge of his union with the deceased. We trust the Lord has kindly relieved her from the evils to come, and that from her obedience to the truth and the love of it, she will have a part in the first resurrection. Sister Pratt, had for years been in a feeble state of health, yet she has endured with her husband, the slanderous calumny and abuse of this present generation, and once been driven by a ruthless mob from a peaceable dwelling in Jackson County Mo. in consequence of her religion. She shared with her partner in the loss and abuse incident to that unhallowed and disgraceful scene, and returned with him to this state. She has been deprived of his society much of the time since her marriage, having ill health, and her peculiar anxieties for him in his absence, to prey upon & depress her spirit. But she is now released from her clayey tenement. The Lord has kindly invited her home. Transcribed and proofread by David Grow, Jan. 2006 Note: Puerpual fever is defined as “blood poisoning following childbirth.” If a woman died shortly after childbirth (as Thankful did), it was most often due to this condition. Woodruff's Journal In the latter part of the day Elder Warren Parrish preached the funeral sermon of Sister Pratt, the wife of Elder Parley P. Pratt, one of the Twelve Apostles. Wilford Woodruff’s Journal, 82 - Journal History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Mar. 26, 1837, 1 References * Gravesite of Thankful Halsey Pratt * Histories of the wives of Parley Pratt